Ig Nobels Highlight Science of a Special KindWhy don't woodpeckers get headaches? Why don't people like the sound of fingernails on a chalkboard? And what happens when you break a piece of raw spaghetti? Those are big questions, and solving them would be worthy of an award — well, at least an Ig Nobel award.

Why don't woodpeckers get headaches? Why don't people like the sound of fingernails on a chalkboard? And what happens when you break a piece of raw spaghetti? Those are big questions, and solving them would be worthy of an award — well, at least an Ig Nobel award.

The 16th First Annual Ig Nobel Prizes featured paper airplanes, a teenager repellent and a lot of inertia. We talk to author Marc Abrahams about this special kind of research.